Wed 23 Sep 2009
On Email (and Facebook)
Posted by Joseph Ugoretz under Email
[2] Comments
Is email an important method of communication for you? I hear all the time (usually in a cranky old-person voice :-)) that “kids today don’t use email. They only care about that texting facebook machine thing.” I’m not sure if that’s entirely true or not, and I know that I heard the same kind of thing years ago about–“kids today don’t write letters. They only want to pick up the telephone, even if it’s long-distance.” But for us at Macaulay, email is a fairly important and fairly efficient way for us to push information out to our students (and others).
And we’ve recently made a switch in the way we provide email accounts to our students. In the past, like many colleges (like all the CUNY campuses) we automatically created an honorscollege.cuny.edu email address for each new student. Then (two years ago) we switched (to reflect our new name!) to macaulay.cuny.edu email addresses. But we found that most students weren’t really using their Macaulay email accounts at all–or if they were, they were just forwarding to another email address (usually their campus address or a gmail or yahoo account). So, starting last year, we did not create Macaulay email accounts automatically. Any student who requested one, got one, but only if they specifically made the request. We got maybe a dozen requests last year.
Then two things happened this past summer. We switched to a new system (hosted by Google) for all the existing accounts (mostly alumni). And Facebook finally, after two years of official requests and student petitions, created Macaulay Honors College as a “network” (like just about every other college in the country). In order to join that Macaulay network, all you need is a Macaulay email address. Once that happened, and we announced it, things changed. A dozen or so students requested Macaulay email accounts in all of last year. This year, in approximately one month, over 200 students have requested (and received) Macaulay email accounts. So does this mean that the new email system is so fantastic that students love it and want to be a part of it? Or does it mean that Facebook is so important that students will accept an email account they don’t really need, just to be a part of that Facebook network?
You decide. Let us know! You can leave a comment on this post, or as always, email me! joseph.ugoretz@mhc.cuny.edu (and of course if you don’t have a Macaulay email account yet, and you want one, or if you’re having any trouble with or questions about your Macaulay email account, you can email me for that, too).
2 Responses to “ On Email (and Facebook) ”
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I wanted a Macaulay email address mostly for the Facebook network. I would use the Macaulay email more if it was shorter (i.e. mhc.cuny.edu instead of macaulay.cuny.edu) and if we had the option to shorten our names in the email address, like from Jonathan to Jon).
Some good points, Ben, thanks. I didn’t really realize that the length was an issue (would a five-letter difference really matter? Especially when it’s the same number of syllables if you’re saying it?).
For complicated reasons, we can’t have students and staff on the same domain, and mhc.cuny.edu is already reserved for staff. We thought students would rather have the real (more recognizable) name.
But this is still worth thinking about more. Shortening student’s name (using a nickname like “Jon”) is definitely a possibility, if that’s something people would like.
Also, you can still forward your Macaulay email to whichever address you prefer to use (or if using gmail, fetch it directly from your preferred account).